BodyGlove street and beach campaign shot in Santa Barbara, California, featuring model/athlete Rebecca Jamgochian.
A collection of collaged photos featuring wildfire-illuminated air, ocean, land, and wildlife during sunset.
On November 6, 2024, a fast-moving wildfire erupted in Ventura County, throwing people’s lives into abrupt chaos. Brilliant light and color from a wildfire are in stark contrast to the chaotic destruction and emotional havoc happening at the very same time. This is my attempt at creating something beautiful out of a terrible disaster.
When I get to shoot and edit a campaign that’s all about living your best life, I know I’m living my best life! As a lifelong athlete, I have all the aches and pains that hold me back and prevent me from soaking in the overflowing abundance that the great state of California offers. @rasheensmith founded @flexpower as an athlete at @ucberkeleyofficial, working in the lab to create a sports cream that didn’t smell like minty misery, something that would alleviate the need for prescription meds (cue a national health crisis), something anyone can use to #getmovingstaymoving. So many good reasons to get behind this, grateful and lucky to have been part of bringing the Flexpower story to life with this truly legit all star team of positive thinkers and expert doers.
KassiaSurf is an eco-friendly lifestyle brand in the women's action sports industry that celebrates water women everywhere by offering the most responsibly sourced and spiritually uplifting products to accentuate each experience.
Through short films and still photography, I sought to extend the brand by showing powerful women athletes in their element of water, combining the beauty and emotionally freeing qualities of athleticism and grace with a product line that supports the consciousness-raising "positive vibe" found in the space where action meets mindfulness.
"KASSIA+SURF wetsuits are created with the best quality materials to maximize the surf experience. We chose the best, most durable neoprene on the market and custom dyed all our fabric to ensure longer lasting suits with visually dynamic, vibrant colors. And we didn’t stop there; putting extra care and attention into the details, the seams on each suit feature a double blind stitching with taped and glued seams for additional durability and warmth."
Onda Wellness Hemp Harvest at Casad Family Farms
About a year ago, I began research for a documentary about sustainable cannabis/hemp farms. Initially I was interested in women owned operations, however, as is the case with most documentaries, you don’t actually know where your questions will lead.
Naturally, the first person I called is the matriarch of @rancho_organics, the currently leader of three generations of sustainably focused central Californian cannabis hemp farmers. She shared that Cate Havstad Casad @havstadhatco and her family @casadfamilyfarms have a biodynamic farm growing cannabis hemp for @onda.wellness. That was all the info I needed to send me off on a trajectory made possible by @iamstephensmith, the founder of Onda Wellness. I am so grateful to Stephen for allowing us to bond so quickly around the excitement of this once a year harvest and inviting me to capture it all with my camera.
Within a week an a half, I was on a pandemic empty Alaska Airlines flight to Portland with all my trusty Canon C100 and favorite lenses jammed into my little Pelican case, double masked, and having no idea what I’d be shooting for three days. From experience I did know that it would probably involve very little sleep because I’d want many shots as the sun rose and set. And the sky would be that eerily dreamy orange pink due to the wildfires surrounding this rural, tight knit farming community just an hour north of Bend. The thought of shooting plants in that light excited me to no end.
A huge thank you to @onda.wellness and @casadfamilyfarms for allowing me to embed (literally - laying the truck bed was one of my favorite shots) with your crew during these nonstop 3 days before the rain came. I dream of going back someday to explore more and rekindle the harvest love affair.
Music by @toddhannigan
Lifestyle campaign documentary-style photography for Rancho Organics. Rancho Organics is one of the oldest woman owned organic hemp and cannabis farm in California. This is an ongoing project that I began in 2020.
About the company:
Rancho is committed to sustainable farming and wellness from planting the seed to hand crafting the solution. Three generations of sustainably focused farmers produce top quality cannabis hemp, right here on our Central California family farm.
We do not tolerate the use of harmful toxins or chemicals in our bodies or on our family land, and we are committed to maintaining whole-plant integrity in our formulations. What began as a solution to help loved ones dealing with chronic pain and illness, eventually lead to the creation of a product line known for its high level of effectiveness. We believe this to be the result of sourcing and utilizing our own proprietary, high-CBD cannabis hemp, and hand-crafting all of our formulations in small batches at low temperatures. This ensures there is no loss of terpenes, cannabinoids (the naturally occurring chemical compounds that provide the medicinal properties) or other beneficial compounds found in whole-plant hemp.
@malia_ward x @benefitcosmetics #hoola = dream job...all shot in a half day. Written, directed, edited, shot (stills and water unit), produced and prop styled by me with @rhack, DP and @granthilling, aerial. Malia is not only a world class surfer, she is pure professionalism on set - at the location before sunrise and working every moment to get all the shots. Can’t believe this was 2019 and the campaign is still running! Love that kind of success.
Rich in outdoor history, Alpenlite has been revived for a new generation of risk takers and thrill seekers. The bags are thoughtfully designed for carrying your everyday essentials to housing the necessities for outdoor adventures.
I partnered with the founders to develop a California lifestyle look and feel as unique as the Golden State. Deliverables included creative brief, mood boards, photography, typography and logo development.
In partnership with Beckon executives, famed illustrator John Hersey and animator Craig Sarachene, I developed and produced a comprehensive visual identity system with the single intention of delivering a final package that worked much like a symphony. I imagined a composition of lush, lyrical elements that describe the very human, honest soul of Beckon's novel, highly sophisticated enterprise marketing products that magically and elegantly unlock valuable insights from overwhelming amounts of big data.
I began work on the project back in February after competing with a few other creatives in a "bake off" — a "winner takes all" format where, if your creative concept hits home, you're hired. Over many months of work, the team constantly iterated on the visual story as Beckon's new messaging emerged. We communicated ideas via rough animations and sound design, mood boards, sketches and a lot of discussions about expressing the true essence of the Beckon brand. What we ultimately came away with was an overarching, versatile structure that carries the look, feel and message across myriad communication channels that typically make up today's marketing platform...including a "behind the scenes" video and a food truck for Ad Week, of course.
Bynder is an Amsterdam based company in the digital asset management space. I came on board as they began acquiring companies in the US to expand their global reach. I managed an internationally dispersed design team and implemented original brand experiences and advertising campaigns across various media platforms, from social to events that drove sales to new heights. Internally, I worked to increase the cultural integration of the new California office through shooting and editing videos of company milestones.
An Amsterdam brand moves to Cali
Increasing adoption and love of brand and culture is critical to the health of a company. I used my documentary filmmaking experience to capture candid moments as Bynder rolled out their brand in the US.
Bynder at Adobe MAX/Los Angeles
Traditionally, Adobe MAX is not viewed by the Bynder sales team as a valuable stop on the trade show tour. In the past, none were captured. I aimed to change that by inventing an unforgettable, purpose-built, documentary driven experience. As it turns out, over 20 high quality leads were collected. I took inspiration from the Amsterdam Team’s award-winning project from the previous year called, “The Art of Organizing”. For the Los Angeles activation, I went completely local and hired “Smile Mountain” artists, Joel Fox and Jennifer Jordan Day to create an exciting new manifestation.
“To explore the weird and wonderful edges of the human brain, we challenged Bart Eysink Smeets, one of the most creative guys we know, to delve into the art of organizing. The Amsterdam-based artist has given himself 2 weeks to take up the hefty challenge of blending organization and creativity together.”
Lifestyle campaign for Unfurling.
Multifunctional wraps and goods founded by @ashleylloydsurfboards
Laura Rubin, founder of AllSwell Creative, invited me to photograph one of her incredible workshops at the historic Venice Beach House in Los Angeles. For this event Laura invited notable artist Alison Kunath to lead an exuberant group on an engaging journey in an array of serious and playful exercises focused on drawing, writing and, most importantly, putting pen to paper.
About AllSwell Writing Workshops
AllSwell Writing Workshops are designed to do just that. You’ll be led through accessible writing-based activities by AllSwell founder Laura Rubin. We all need inspiration. To that end, Laura curates a selection of literature from the greats, such as Twain, Melville and Whitman, to serve as touch points throughout the process.
You don’t need to have any background whatsoever in writing or literature to enjoy these experiences. The mere act of putting pen to paper is illuminating. There’s no wrong way to do this. As Papa (a.k.a. Hemingway) said: write drunk, edit sober. We’re not suggesting you go get lit up. The point is, don’t judge the process. Give your yourself permission to start somewhere. The activity itself has value. The therapeutic benefit of doing it is why it should be done.
We develop the content around themes that suit the setting, partner or sponsor, whether that’s overlooking the Pacific Ocean in Malibu or in the desert amidst Joshua Tree National Forest.
"One of the most enjoyable gatherings in recent memory. I love the way you lead, the questions, dialogue... the passages! Watching that discovery of such an obvious act that we've lost to our frantic lives is like finding sunken treasure. Thank you for having me along."
— Beth O'Rourke, Filmmaker
Branding, consulting, design, visual identity, user experience across all digital platforms, physical product, website, copy, and photography for start-up, "Handy Right Bag Co."
"From overhead bins to the grocery store to the great outdoors, this bag is full-on ready to run with you. Simple, sturdy and designed with a focus on just the essential features, there’s really no limit to where you’ll go with this backpack/tote bag combo, constructed out of recycled sail cloth."
Advertising campaigns in the demand generation-centric business to business space can be very dry feature/offer driven. Rather than going the way of a bulleted list of "value", I chose to take a customer-centric, character-driven, narrative approach that embraced the idea of showcasing the power of GoToMeeting through highlighting interesting customer stories.
The result was a complete 360 degree marketing turnaround for the company, driving product trials to new heights. The campaign began as a web series and grew into multiple media channels: TV (ESPN, CNN, NBC, Fox News, BBC, Comedy Central, E!), web (desktop and mobile), print, outdoor, video, digital display/rich media, social, sales, direct mail, trade show, and PR.
The creative/marketing goal was to directly relate to the small to medium size B2B market through real life stories of how GoToMeeting was one of the most valuable, everyday business tools in their management quiver.
Ultimately, I was awarded "Citrix Brand Champion" award for my work in transforming audience perceptions of several brands, including GoToMeeting, GoToAssist (remote support) and GoToMyPC (remote access).
I also overhauled the incumbent model of using multiple agencies (which was resulting in fractured, inconsistent messaging across channels) and structured an "in house agency" model using a mix of staff designers and developers with modest support from a few new external agencies including Duncan/Channon SF.
Citrix/GoToMeeting advertising series was created, written, managed, and produced by Beth O'Rourke, Creative Director.
Crew included Jeff Den Broeder/SiloMedia, Director, Alex Kopps, Director of Photography, Jessica Congdon, Editor, Laura Flippen, Emily Nathan, and Chris Reardon, Photographers.
A leading Hollywood VFX studio had an urgent need to scale capacity.
Arch was born.
Arch Platform Technologies, founded by Guy Botham with Edward Churchward, was purpose-built to create high-quality visual effects for Vitality VFX, a leading visual effects studio.
The platform is now used by major Hollywood studios.
For this project I created a complete branded system, beginning with the logo, across multiple platforms: website, photography, product UX elements, motion graphics and business communications templates.
As the story goes, The Malibu Surfing Association (MSA) was founded on a November day in 1961 in the playroom of Butch Linden's Malibu Colony house. A bunch of guys were sitting around drinking (soda!) and someone mentioned that they ought to start a surf club -- establishing world-wide dominance in the sport of surfing. Everyone already knew Malibu had the best surfers. Okay - so maybe that wasn't their original goal, but the end result isn't far from it.
As Team Captain and Board Member of MSA, I'm proud to carry on the honored traditions and customs of our club by building our social media presence and designing and printing gear so members can proudly display their affiliation.
Each month we hold our open meeting at Dukes, Malibu at 7:00 PM. All members of the community are invited to attend.
The mission, as set by Jascha Kayaks-Wolff, CMO of Mozilla, was to take a stand against, “shitty executive headshots”. To remedy this he invited a small creative team, headed up by me, to invent a visually engaging and culturally relevant way to represent their executive team publicly.
To solve this puzzle, I pulled together a crew with pro photographer, Emily Nathan, to bring consistency, stylish sensibility, and high production value by utilizing a consistent focal length, depth of field, quality of light, and professional retouching.
We used photography techniques that resulted in warm, human, bright, colorful, casual images of professional people portraying the best, relaxed versions of themselves. We achieved this by using a natural light/daylight aesthetic and a shallow depth of focus, allowing their face to be the focal point of the image, with the background falling away, giving it a very bold, clean, contemporary look.
See all final portraits of Mozilla's Leadership Team here.
Hello Wonder unlocks the whole internet for kids with an AI browser to keep them safe and guide their growth.
Hello Wonder is a very early-stage AI start-up founded by two tech industry veterans. I built an action-packed brand (the mascot, “star wonder”) coupled with a branded experience that began with a pitch deck and extended all the way to the in app experience.
